


I'll find my way home

by anathematician



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Doomfrost - Freeform, Genderfluid Loki (Marvel), Other, Romance, They're meant to be together, to be fair neither does loki, victor von doom doesn't know how to relationship, villains in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2021-01-25 20:20:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21362116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anathematician/pseuds/anathematician
Summary: Loki had weathered the reality-refacing storm of their reunion. The clouds had parted, and the world was not as it once was. Victor standing in front of them resplendent, unmarred, and wearing purple of all colors was evidence of that.
Relationships: Loki & Victor von Doom, Loki/Victor von Doom
Comments: 2
Kudos: 16





	I'll find my way home

Victor von Doom was afraid. 

An orb the color of sea glass insinuated itself in the room. It floated from wall to wall like an untethered balloon before passing in front of his face where it finally settled, finally finding its target. The wild energy radiating within played on Victor’s features like firelight. It dilated and constricted like an angry eye. He held its gaze.

The orb pulled back, pitching itself high into the faux-coffers carved in the ceiling. Vases, banners, and the motley crew of expressionless sculptures that made up the gallery of the Latverian Embassy revealed themselves under the orb's penetrating glow. From somewhere unseen, a voice broke the silence. 

"I've missed you.” Loki's face leapt out at Victor from the darkness. "I've really missed you." 

Loki was many things, but they were never this vulnerable. Victor knew it had to be true. _Missed. You. _The words strummed the chords of newly roused emotions, building up a symphony inside of Victor that he had only one name for: love. It sounded so sweet. 

The silence that hung between them in the gallery was jarring. He knew that they maintain this impasse for hours, stubborn as they were. There was a part of him that wanted to stay like this, even if he knew that no amount of stalling could buy him enough time to marshal his thoughts. 

He felt himself move toward Loki, drawn to them like a moth to a flame. That sweet music swelled within him again, and damn it all, he wanted so badly to be near them again at last. He wanted to feel their flame and be burned by it over and over again because it was what they both deserved. Would it be enough to take away all the pain, longing, and resentment? 

Victor's pride pleaded with him to freeze, to turn his face away and let his ego eclipse his mounting shame in the way that he had commanded it to for years, for far greater grievances. Why should Victor von Doom ever need to defend himself? He remembered that night seven years ago. They had found equilibrium in each other’s company. They wouldn’t admit it, not even privately, but they were happy in their own way. It was too beautiful. He couldn’t let it go on. Not when there was so much work to be done. He left Loki and the fragile peace that they had secured for themselves in the middle of the afternoon, leaving no note. It was what his pride demanded. 

Victor tried, and failed, to avoid Loki’s eyes.Now he would give them what they demanded. After all this time, he owed them that much. 

Loki bathed in the artificial moonlight of their orb, baring themselves to Victor and looking every bit the part of a vengeful goddess. It was a sight not meant for his mortal eyes, but he couldn't tear himself away. Loki wasn't flesh and blood like Victor. Loki was chaos, magic, and ichor threaded together in a sublime tapestry. Be that as it may, Loki was no less immune to a broken heart. Victor could see the cost of his actions chiseled in the features of his lover’s face. He latched onto the details he'd been starved of for too long. Their cheekbones seemed to him more pronounced now, hollowed by a hunger for the presence of someone they thought would never return. Their eyes were heavy-lidded, like they’d been torn from their sleep too many times. Their marvelous, resigned mouth hadn't changed, though. It reminded him still of a poppy in heavy bloom.

When he thought he would choke on the silence, Victor managed to summon a few words: "It seems like you've finally found me." 

The corners of his mouth curled into something that was more a grimace than the guilty smile he was hoping for. Emoting wasn’t exactly his forte. Since the time he was a young man, that same mouth had been pulled into a perpetual snarl by a web of scar tissue. Risorius melded to zygomaticus. A mask of fused fascia that Victor could never forget, and he knew Loki never would either. He’d adapt, just as he always had. 

Curiosity claimed Loki, and they closed the space between them. They touched Victor’s cheek lightly, in the way that they knew he liked. Unblemished skin registered under Loki's fingertips and their eyes softened. There was no pity, Victor thought, and maybe there were even flecks of understanding. What’s more, they were warm and filled with love the way they used to be when things had felt so much simpler. 

Victor could see something else in them, too. Truth. No, Loki would never forget the man that had once been Doctor Doom..but they would understand the man he had become in his absence. They cupped his chin in their hands and pulled him closer still. Victor Von Doom had been afraid. He had been a prisoner of the past for too long, but the uncertain future he now toed was a bubbling, gulping mire laid before him. He would not have to pass through it alone. 

***

The swirling blackness became a whirling blackness, and Loki's stomach churned. They felt themself be distributed through time and space. They were being careless. _Let it tear me apart_, they thought. Their portal yawned wide. Darkness collided with darkness. They stepped through the portal and met the unlit bowels of the Latverian Embassy. Loki had been here before, and only once. They’d never forget it. 

A little over four years ago, a battery had discharged in one of Victor's earlier Doombot models causing a temporary energy spike that sent warning messages cascading down a monitor that Loki would quickly become acquainted with. When they finally tracked it to its source, they tore the door to the storage closet off its hinges just to get to it. On that night, Loki held onto the hope that it was Victor, accessing the suit remotely to send them a message. They hoped that it was all a misunderstanding, that Victor had spirited himself away to a sub-dimension to set the record straight on one of his many debts, and now desperately needed Loki to recite a spell that tasted like jagged metal on their tongue to open up a portal so that he could finally come home. Loki hoped he would stumble into the service corridor, reeking of demons and spite, and bury himself in their arms where he knew he belonged. Nothing of the sort. When they watched as the Doombot's eyes dim and flicker out forever, some part of Loki faded with it. That dream still played out many times over in Loki’s imagination, in the self-soothing way that many similar fantasies had unfolded before. On this night, it gave them something nice to hold onto as they traversed the sea of space between Castle Doom and the embassy. 

There had been another energy spike at the Latverian Embassy—so sharp, so much stronger than the one before, and for those reasons, too good to be true. The Embassy had its share of possible culprits: mystic texts, ancient relics, fine art that probably bound the severed soul of a Hell lord. Victor had overseen the space’s partial transition to a Kunst-und-Wunderkammer. Yes, it was pretentious. That wasn’t particularly surprising. Yes, it did serve as fantastic bait for the growing number of people who had a mind to get their hands on the treasures the embassy held. It also made for a cunning diplomacy play. As Victor had put it, it was time that Latveria position itself as an exporter of culture and not just transient gods. (As charming as they may be.) All that to say, there was nothing housed within the embassy that would shock Loki. If some eldritch horror wrenched itself from the pages of a moldy manuscript, smearing primordial goo across the shelves, they’d dispatch it without a second thought. This night felt different. The mysterious aura called to Loki, and they could feel themself charmed by it. They allowed themself a moment to lean into what felt like pure delusion: this energy signature was familiar. They could feel it, now: a strong, steady pulse gaining distinction as Loki ventured through the halls. Could it be…a heartbeat. 

Magic welled inside the palm of their outstretched hand, molding itself into a sphere that was a fraction brighter than they would have liked, but it would do. It rolled and bobbed in the pitch-black of the room, traveling from end to another like the beacon of a lighthouse. It passed over a warped, Brancusian golem that sat high on a marble pedestal. It stroked the edge of the walls and wrapped itself around its corners before finding its mark. 

Victor von Doom stood in the center of the room, his arm wrapped around the ankle of one of his own titanium likenesses. He wore a sheepish look on his face that Loki had seen before, and a two-piece suit in an unpleasant shade of kalamata that they were certain they had not. The scarf that hung around his neck was made all the more unusual as it was July and stifling hot in most parts of the world. The dress shirt he wore underneath was unbuttoned at the top, and that was the only thing that made sense about the whole ensemble. It was at that moment Loki realized that maybe, just maybe, a man that made a full-time commitment to wearing suits of armor didn't have the best contemporary fashion instincts. Loki could find plenty else to fault him for. 

They allowed the orb to soften. The harsh light did nothing for Victor’s good looks. Looks that bore scrutiny under Loki's gaze. Where was the mess of scars spanning jawline to cheekbone? Who had mended his crushed maxilla? The drooping under-eyelid? The horror of his flesh that he would only let Loki trace with their fingertips and lips, and only then in complete darkness? Who had erased decades of pain and torment, and why had they done it? Why now? They could feel Victor writhe knowingly, and for what may be the first time, Loki felt ashamed of their many questions. Loki always expected to find him, if they ever found him at all, exactly as he was the day he left: sullen, brooding, imperious…shiny. How presumptuous of them to think that after all this time, Victor wouldn’t have changed a bit. Those seven years were nothing to a god, in the grand scheme of things, but for Loki it was everything. Maybe it was a great deal more to Victor too. 

Loki had weathered the reality-refacing storm of their reunion. The clouds had parted, and the world was not as it once was. Victor standing in front of them resplendent, unmarred, and wearing purple of all colors was evidence of that. _But where do we go from here? _Their voice shook as they spoke the words that had been on the tip of their tongue for seven agonizing years: "I've missed you. I’ve really missed you." The quickening drum of Victor’s heart let them know that he had missed them too. 


End file.
